The Premature Demise of the News Groups – Not
There has been stories of late talking about the possible end of USENET and the newsgroups based on the fact that certain states are asking ISPs to block large blocks of the binary newsgroups because of the concern of kiddie porn. Now far be it from me to advocate kiddie porn, but there's got to be a limit to the assumption of guilt as opposed to having it proven beyond a reasonable doubt. That is, after all, what we're all about, right?
In An American President, in one of the most eloquent speeches written, the President says:
You want free speech? Let's see you acknowledge a man whose words make your blood boil, who's standing center stage and advocating at the top of his lungs that which you would spend a lifetime opposing at the top of yours.
You want to claim this land as the land of the free? Then the symbol of your country can't just be a flag; the symbol also has to be one of its citizens exercising his right to burn that flag in protest. Show me that, defend that, celebrate that in your classrooms. Then, you can stand up and sing about the "land of the free"
To me, the best our country is about is captured in those paragraphs. Sure, we've got liberty, but the best part about it is that I'm free from you imposing yourself on me. Majority rules, minority is heard.
Then someone decides that people are doing something wrong and they need to be stopped. Hey, I've got an idea... enforce the laws already on the books. When bank robbers moved from six-shooters to computers the FBI didn't need any new laws to catch them. They got smart and caught them. Period.
Don't take away the newsgroups because some one decides to use them illegally. Stop him (or her). Don't take something away from me. Don't ask to make your job easier at the expense of my freedoms. Lock the bad guys up, and leave the newsgroups alone.